You don’t hear the phrase “Japanese muscle car” much. But they do exist, and with an estimated top speed of 190 mph, Nissan’s new GT-R is the most jacked-up of the bunch. It invokes a line of Godzilla-powerful cars dating back to 1969, when Nissan gifted a humble salaryman sedan with a sports car engine. The ’09 model is part track star, part video game, and all awesome. And best of all, at a starting price of around $70,000, it might just be the supercar bargain of this century.

The Power Plant The 3.8-liter aluminum-clad V-6 is a high-tech beast, cranking out 480 horsepower and 434 foot-pounds of torque. It’s endowed with one turbocharger for each bank of cylinders—in other words, two of them—computer-controlled goodies like variable-valve timing, and cylinder bores sprayed with a space-age plasma material that greatly reduces friction. We’re sure Pops Racer would approve. Ha ha!

Design Cues Nissan designers created a futuristic and functional car that still manages to pay homage to GT-Rs of the past. Those aesthetes who believe the classic Jaguar XKE is the pinna­cle of automotive design may be disturbed by some of the jarring lines, but engineers wind-tunnel-tuned the body shape to reduce drag to levels barely beaten by the near-frictionless Toyota Prius. ’Course this car goes a hair quicker.

UnderpinningsLike the tranny, the four-wheel independent suspension with electronically controlled shocks offers three modes: normal/sport for automatic damping; comfort for when the boss is on board; and R, or race mode, which dials maximum damping for high-speed cornering. Stopping power comes from 15-inch vented discs underneath wide, nitrogen-filled run-flats. You see room for a spare tire?

TransmissionThe GT-R’s engine is mated to a six-speed, dual-clutch manumatic. That means there’s no clutch pedal, so shifting is done by pounding the paddles on either side of the wheel. Three driver-selectable gear modes handle almost any situation: normal; snow for managing torque output to reduce wheel spin; and R, or race, which facilitates gear swaps in 0.2 seconds. Think of the time you’ll save!